- Reduced outage risk of constant upgrades
- Reallocated resources to innovation initiatives
Established in 1853, the University of Melbourne is the second oldest university in Australia and the oldest in Victoria. Today, it proudly holds the rank of number one in Australia and is one of the top ranked universities globally. The University draws nearly 55,000 students and employs 10,000 staff across seven campuses. As a leader in education and research, The University of Melbourne is focused on addressing the world’s pressing social, economic and environmental challenges.
The University’s mission is to impact society positively through transformative education and research, aiming to help elevate Australia as a progressive, globally influential country. By 2030, it aspires to provide students with a distinctive education that prepares them as future leaders and responsible global citizens. Moreover, the University seeks to be recognized for its outstanding research and commitment to collaboration, driven by a vibrant community and strong connections with the city of Melbourne.
Solving for stable Oracle systems with room for innovation
“We support all the University’s enterprise systems and services – from data centers and networks to our enterprise applications like ERP and CRM,” explained Daniel Buttigieg, Director of Enterprise Technology at the University of Melbourne. “These systems underpin our operations, whether it’s handling financial or HR transactions, managing service requests or engaging with our staff and students. A lot of investment goes into those underlying systems and services to ensure that they are stable and when we see a new opportunity to deliver new capabilities, we’re ready to go.” Buttigieg says he sees himself and his team as being enablers to allow the University to swiftly deliver new services.
With the University’s focus on adapting to modern educational needs, Buttigieg’s team was looking for ways to innovate while maintaining an extensive Oracle footprint consisting of Oracle Database, EBS and Hyperion and dealing with the associated vendor support costs. “We weren’t seeing an investment in the platform that was appropriate to the size of the support cost that we were paying. So, by moving over to Rimini Street and not getting access to those new releases really wasn’t impacting us at all because we weren’t seeing the value of that investment through our support costs” Buttigieg noted.
The University not only trusts Rimini Support™ for Oracle for their mission critical systems, but they also consume multiple elements of the Rimini ONE™ portfolio to address other IT needs. Rimini ONE provides end-to-end services, support and products for enterprise software through multiple offerings. Rimini Connect™ for Email is a part of the Rimini Connect suite which uses patented technologies to extend the life of enterprise software. Rimini Connect for Email ensures the University’s enterprise software remains compatible with authentication and protocol updates as mail servers evolve. With Rimini Protect™, Buttigieg safeguards the University’s applications and middleware against known and unknown threats and vulnerabilities. This combination lets Buttigieg optimize resources, avoid compatibility issues and ensure effective protection against security threats by working with one trusted vendor.
Protecting customizations and breaking the upgrade cycle
Since moving to Rimini Street, Buttigieg has observed significant improvements. “We’re experiencing much better responsiveness when issues arise. The communication is prompt, and problems no longer languish in queues for months. And we don’t need to go through frequent upgrade cycles to maintain vendor support,” he shared. With a highly customized environment like the University’s, which consists of more than 300 customizations, upgrades can be a time- and resource-intensive task. In addition to the impact on his team, “It’s time consuming for us, but also for our users because they’re involved in the change management process,” Buttigieg explained.
“Before Rimini Street, in order for us to remain supported by the vendor, we had to continually upgrade on their timeline just so when we put in a ticket, they don’t come back to us and say, ‘Sorry, but you’re not on a version we support anymore,’” said Buttigieg. “We were stuck in a perpetual cycle of upgrades, each one taking months of preparation, testing and deployment. The risks were equally high. If an upgrade or security patching goes wrong, we could lose access to things like our ERP or identity management system, which can be catastrophic for an organization of our size and the number of staff and students that we have,” he explained. Without the constant cycle of vendor upgrades just to stay supported, Buttigieg is now free to reallocate resources to priorities that better serve the University’s IT roadmap.
Staying ahead of innovation with end-to-end support for Oracle software
The University of Melbourne’s investment with Rimini Street demonstrates how large institutions can optimize IT support, use savings to move resources to innovation and improve the educational experience. By alleviating the burdens associated with traditional vendor support models, the University can advance its mission to help position Australia as an ambitious, forward-thinking country while increasing its reputation and influence globally. “The savings we’re achieving by moving to Rimini Street are enabling us to reinvest in developing new digital solutions and enhancing online access for our users,” he said.
Based on the University’s experience, Buttigieg advises other institutions that are rethinking the vendor support model to, “Understand the products you’re using, what value you’ve extracted and the vendor’s roadmap. If you’re not seeing year-on-year improvements, consider redirecting your investment to a vendor like Rimini Street. The cost savings can be reinvested into other technologies, helping you stay ahead in other areas of your IT strategy.”
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